At least two people have been arrested in connection with the killing of a police officer during a mob violence in India’s Uttar Pradesh state, officials have said.
A Special Investigation Team (SIT) has been constituted to probe the cause of the violence in Bulandshahr district, senior police officer Prashant Kumar told local ANI news agency.
Police have filed cases against at least 27 people, including a Hindu far-right leader, in connection with the violence that saw police station torched by the angry crowd.
Hundreds of para-military forces have been deployed in the area, said ADG Law and Order Anand Kumar.
Inspector Subodh Kumar Singh and a 20-year-old man died after a crowd of about 400 people, who were protesting against alleged cow slaughter, turned violent in Bulandshahr, about 80km from southeast of the capital, New Delhi.
The officer died from gunshot wounds, district magistrate Anuj Kumar Jha told Reuters news agency on Monday.
The official vehicle of martyred cop Subodh Kumar Singh which was torched by the goons. During the attack Singh was cornered in a field next to Chingrawati police outpost in Bulandshahr. pic.twitter.com/KbP0eM7dZv
— Piyush Rai (@PiyushRaiTOI) December 4, 2018
“We sent police teams to control the crowd after we heard protesters pelted stones and some even opened fire,” Jha told DPA news agency by phone.
“It is not clear this was firing from the crowd or the police,” he said, adding the protests subsided by early evening.
According to local media reports, the deceased officer investigated the 2015 lynching of Mohammed Akhlaq in Dadri district of the state before he was transferred.
Hindu vigilantes often roam the roads in northern India to protect cows, frequently resulting in assaults against India’s Muslim population – some 14 percent of the country’s 1.3 billion people.
Thirty-nine people have been killed in cow-related violence in India since 2014 when Prime Minister Narendra Modi’s Bharatiya Janata Party (BJP) came to power, according to data portal IndiaSpend.
Inspector Subodh kumar singh sacrificed his life to uphold law & order in the district.
With his demise, we have lost one of our finest officers who will always be alive in our hearts as our hero.
Our condolences for his family members & prayers for the noble soul. #UPPolice pic.twitter.com/8azl0Hzlk3— UP POLICE (@Uppolice) December 3, 2018
Modi has condemned the attacks and promised tough action against the perpetrators, but opposition leaders accuse the BJP governments of indirectly supporting the cow vigilantes.
“It’s a shocking state of affairs… Who gives these people the authority to take law in their hands?” Kapil Sibal from the opposition Congress party told ANI.
In July, India’s Supreme Court requested that the government enact new legislation to end an increase in mob violence and lynchings that have reportedly killed more than two dozen people accused of cattle theft, eating beef, child kidnapping and other crimes in the country this year.
SOURCE:
Al Jazeera and news agencies
